GATHERED BY THE WAY 
Mr. Wallace thinks that the bird-eater mimics the 
insect-eater, so as to deceive the birds, which are 
not afraid of the latter. But if the two hawks look 
alike, would not the birds come to regard them both 
as bird-eaters, since one of them does eat birds? 
Would they not at once identify the harmless one 
with their real enemy and thus fear them both alike ? 
If the latter were newcomers and vastly in the minor- 
ity, then the ruse might work for a while. But if there 
were ten harmless hawks around to one dangerous 
one, the former would quickly suffer from the char- 
acter of the latter in the estimation of the birds. 
Birds are instinctively afraid of all hawk kind. 
Wallace thinks it may be an advantage to cuckoos, 
a rather feeble class of birds, to resemble the hawks, 
but this seems to me far-fetched. True it is, if the 
sheep could imitate the wolf, its enemies might keep 
clear of it. Why, then, has not this resemblance 
been brought about? Our cuckoo is a feeble and 
defenseless bird also, but it bears no resemblance 
to the hawk. The same can be said of scores of 
other birds. 
Many of these close resemblances among different 
species of animals are no doubt purely accidental, 
or the result of the same law of variation acting 
under similar conditions. We have a hummingbird 
moth that so closely in its form and flight and man- 
ner resembles a hummingbird, that if this resem- 
blance brought it any immunity from danger it 
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